James Kushiner notes that today a number of Eastern churches celebrate the Prophet Elisha, and that the story of the children and the bears is explicitly raised in a number of Eastern liturgies. I seemed to remember that I had a poem draft on the subject somewhere, and so I do, one in which, of course, it is an allegory, although I am not sure it would be obvious any longer who is meant by the children:
Baldpate
I fear the bears
will be eating children soon,
so much mocking is in the air;
these little children,
playing beside great rivers,
posturing as adults,
when asked for reason
respond at once:
'Baldpate, baldpate.'
Yes, the bears
will be full soon.
And I hope
the mocking will soon stop
for children
are bad for the stomachs
of poor, innocent bears.
